As computers have attained more and more of a prominent role in virtually every aspect of life and every type of business, the need to effectively and efficiently store digital data has intensified. This need is particularly acute in the context of digital images where large amounts of computer memory can be consumed by a single high resolution image. Thus, businesses and the like that frequently develop digital images can find themselves quickly depleting their in-house, on-line storage capabilities for such assets. Businesses in such a position have often reacted by storing these assets off-line, in magnetic or optical storage mediums such as floppy disks and compact disks. In some instances, the digital asset is deleted and retained only in the form of a hard copy, such as a transparency that can be digitized through a scanning process should a future use for the image arise.
While these approaches have alleviated some of the capacity problems associated with storing digital assets, they have suffered from certain deficiencies. For example, off-line storage such as that described above inherently leads to inefficiencies such as administrative costs associated with cataloging digital assets, delays in locating digital data and, in some instances, loss of the asset altogether. Moreover, in those instances where assets are stored in hard copy form as transparencies or the like, re-scanning an image for future use can lead to inefficient redundancies such as repeating digital re-touching, image correction, or color correction procedures and the like. Further, the conversion from digital data to hard copy form and back can result in degradation of image quality.
The rapidly increasing value of digitized images has heightened the importance of efficiently and safely storing and managing digital assets. Indeed, the explosive growth of the internet is indicative of an unprecedented demand for digital media assets and the corresponding increased value such assets are presently enjoying.
The advertizing and publishing industries are both significantly impacted by the ready accessibility (or lack thereof) of digital images. By way of example, advertizing agencies often utilize images of products or the like in the publications they create for their clients. Often these images take the form of photographs or transparencies. To create a distributable product, these agencies often forward the transparencies or photographs to be published to an outside facility for digitizing. After the digital image is created, the outside agency typically stores the data on a floppy disk or the like, and then either ships the digital data to a printer or returns the data to the agency for incorporation in a document to be printed. The printer can then print the desired quantity of the publication.
If, subsequently, the need for additional copies of the publication arises and none of the involved entities has maintained a copy of the digital image, the entire process of shipping the transparencies or photographs to the digitizing facility, scanning the images, and forwarding the re-created digital images to the printer must be repeated. Such a process leads to undesirable costs and possible differences between publication runs due to differences in any corrections or modifications made to the digital image in the two separate digitization processes. These same costs and difficulties can arise in instances where it becomes desirable to re-use a digital asset in a different publication or in a different format altogether (e.g., utilizing an image from a movie in an advertizing brochure).